The bulldozers had been and gone. The construction crews had been here, and now were there. Where once girders roamed and foundations roared, rows of green lawns sprouted from identical plots surrounding identical houses with identical fences behind a seamless, smiling brick wall with a lovely wrought-iron gate.
“Can’t have a gated community without a gate!” chortled the mayor as he shook hands with the developer in front of it, as numerous diligent reporters nodded and took notes and made ‘hmm’ noises.
“Hah,” said the developer. He was an extremely serious man who lived somewhere in that awkward space between ‘compact’ and ‘spherical.’ “Aha. Ha ha ha. Ha HAA. Ha ha ha ha. Aha.”
“Ohohohoho!” agreed the mayor. “Now, is there anything else you’d like to add.”
“Oh, not much,” said the developer solemnly. “I’m just glad to be here at the crossroads – not literally, of course, figure of speech – of a great moment in civic planning between our two communities: the lovely new suburban paradise of Farforest and your town.”
“City. And it’s called Burbics.”
“Yes. Your city. May we proceed forwards in peace and prosperity for all.”
“Splendid!” said the mayor. They shook hands and posed for the photos as the developer sank his fangs through the mayor’s throat and right into the jugular.
***
Farforest’s lots had been reserved well in advance, and it was no great surprise to hear that the little gated community had been filled to the brim within weeks of its official opening. Every house had its enormous, stifling blackout curtains drawn tight, every driveway held an SUV whose windows were tinted abyssal black, and soon the local coffin makers had a booming business overnight, although the specialty groceries were seeing less of an uptick than they’d expected.
“It’s just, we expected them to give more back to the community in general,” griped Wolbert Hamfork, manager of the Very Expensive Market. “And to us in particular. They don’t even order any of our tiny little packages of quinoa and local beef. Those are pretty cool. Do you want to buy one? You should buy one. Discounted, so it’s only fifty-nine ninety-nine. A real deal and a real steal. Practically slitting my own throat, especially with how many of my clerks have anemia right now. Little bastards are all taking sick days. Bet they’re cheating. Can you believe they’re cheating like that?”
“The gall,” proclaimed the soccer matron he was speaking to, wiping away some specks of blood from her lips. “Excuse me, I just finished lunch. By the way, you have an exsanguinated janitor out back.”
“Ugh, ANOTHER one. Thanks.”
“Oh, it’s no problem. There ought to be a law etc. Here’s my card if you want to visit; you look to be a man of exquisite taste.”
***
Changes came in the early summer, not all welcome.
“I can’t believe they shut down the marina and beaches,” said the local yacht club president, Sandy Biff. “I was expecting people with taste and income to flood into Farforest and join our membership so they could talk about booms and mastheads and booze, but instead they signed a petition against the use of running water for recreation, leisure, business, or personal necessity. Frankly that strikes me as overreach. Also they shut down the city’s plumbing, which is making all my servants whiny and listless. Something about the dehydration combined with the anemia that’s been rolling around. Is there something on my neck? You keep looking at my neck. And licking your lips and rolling your tongue sensually around your fangs. Ma’am, are you trying to seduce me?”
“No,” said the genteel retiree.
“Ah, my mistaaaaaaaaaaaargghghhghgh.”
***
By August the course curriculums of the university had been altered by the new board of directors. This produced some tensions in the letters column of the paper.
“My son went to university to get a bachelor’s of ecological engineering,” said Mrs. Gorbspat. “But now his entire major has been rescinded. The only two degrees this institution now offers are a BA in Renfelding and a BSc in Civil Service. And since the only civil service the city provides since the deputy mayor took over is blood drives, I’m not sure how this will help our youth compete in today’s fast-paced economy.”
“My daughter says her new instructor began class by hooking them all up to some sort of gadget that sucked all their blood into big glass decanters, then made them roll those decanters down to a storage cellar,” opined Mr. Hripple. “That seems like the university getting free labour from its students, and we don’t even know what all this blood is for. It’s bad enough our taxes went into building this university a decade ago; now it’s taking the blood and fluids of our children. Or should I say, your children. I’ve subsidized your offspring enough already; I’m a paid taxpayer and a paying taxpaider and I don’t deserve this sort of upjumped gimme-gimme attitude from institutions I’ve been forced to support.”
“The new board is completely out of line,” fumed Dr. Plorr. “They ejected me from chairmanship, then removed me from the building for complaining about it. And they wouldn’t even look me in the eye while they did it! Too busy simpering and tittering and slurping blood from the necks of the president of the student’s union. Sheer poppycockery!”
“Everything is fine,” said the opinion columnist. “If you think everything isn’t fine, that sounds like a ‘you’ problem. And if you have a ‘you’ problem, why not phone in to your local blood bank to support your community? Then your most precious resources can be put towards helping your good friends and neighbours. Like the people of Farforest. All hail Farforest. The blood is life.”
***
Autmn came with the slight political shocker of the deputy mayor being reappointed mayor-for-life without an election.
“I have taken up this position with heavy heart,” mourned the mayor-for-life. He was an extremely serious man who lived somewhere in that awkward space between ‘compact’ and ‘spherical,’ and who had once been a developer. “But this town needs leadership.”
“City,” said the secretary.
“Yes. City. And since you are all sad little squishy sacks of delicious blood that are too busy pulsating with the rich ruddy veins of life and fermenting tender new waves of erythrocytes within your soft little marrow-bones to swim through your bodies, plumply, temptingly. Lend me your necks, friends.”
“Hands?”
“No. Necks. Please put your necks – thank you – in my hands. Mine. Right now. Gimme gimme gimme.”
“I object to this very strongly,” said someone.
“Drain them!” called the mayor-for-life.
“Drain them!” cheered the crowd.
***
That winter was long and brutal. The people suffered under the cold, not least because the barons and baronesses of Farforest had forced all able-bodied workers under the age of forty to spend their days and nights ceaselessly constructing upscale castles, crypts, dungeons, and laboratories in order to show off to each other.
“Perhaps there is some manner of economic imbalance afoot,” commented Maya Holstein-Briggs to her neighbour, Jill Sorbopolis.
“Nah,” said Jill. “Farforest’s construction has attracted money to our community and jobs. This is very plausible. You should join the local bloodteam to stimulate the growth potential of your household. Sign up four other people for it and you can maximize your return on investment.”
“Wow, colour me convinced,” said Maya. “This is the best decision I can make for myself, my family, and my community. And that goes for you too, listeners. Support Farforest. Support blood: you need it to live, they need it to thrive. That’s B-L-O-O-D. One b, one l, double o, one d. Blood. It’s in us, for them to take.”
***
Spring peeled back the comforting blankets of snow and found no city where Burbics had once stood, just a conglomerate of buildings, businesses, and individuals, most of whom now possessed very little blood.
“I declared this town dissolved,” concluded the mayor-for-life. “It’s simply not economically viable anymore. Oh well.”
The residents of Farforest clucked their tongues behind their fangs and shook their heads. So sad, so sad, so sad. Oh well. Oh well.
“In the meantime,” the ex-mayor-for-life went on, “I’ve come into inside information on some great real estate opportunities in Jelonie. Condos all over the place!”
And so the people of Farforest cheered and raised their portfolios high and as one took to the skies in a great cloying cloud of handsomely dressed and fangéd bats, leaving behind a very confused and desolate wasteland.
Unfortunately, the condos didn’t come with blinds. Three months later the entire freshly-moved-in population of the Beyond The Woods condominiums were incinerated at the rise of dawn, along with all the countless accumulated wealth of their real estate valuations. A day of national mourning was observed.
“I can’t help but feel we could have done something for them,” sobbed a prominent realtor. “There must have been something more we could have given.”